Thanks to an anti-religion movie (Religulous) and his frequent stance as a "skeptic," many of my fellow skeptics consider him one of our own, even to the point of giving him an award named after Richard Dawkins. Yet, when it comes to medicine, nothing could be further from the truth. Maher's own words show that he has anti-vaccine views, flirts with germ theory denialism and HIV/AIDS denialism, buys into extreme conspiracy theories about big pharma, and promotes animal rights pseudoscience. That's not a skeptic or a supporter of science-based medicine.

My god can beat up your god. Actually, this is simply a logic test, to see if your deity is logically sound.

Can your beliefs about religion make it across our intellectual battleground?

In this activity you'll be asked a series of 17 questions about God and religion. In each case, apart from Question 1, you need to answer True or False. The aim of the activity is not to judge whether these answers are correct or not. Our battleground is that of rational consistency. This means to get across without taking any hits, you'll need to answer in a way which is rationally consistent. What this means is you need to avoid choosing answers which contradict each other. If you answer in a way which is rationally consistent but which has strange or unpalatable implications, you'll be forced to bite a bullet.

Pretty interesting list of songs. Now all we need is an Atheist anthem.

Like it or not, Christian music is undoubtedly popular. Among my daughter's peer group "Jesus Take the Wheel," by Carrie Underwood, is a very popular song that her friends sing when they get together. During my own adolescence I was an unwilling participant in an evangelical youth group where many discussions took place regarding Christian artists like Amy Grant, Petra, and DC Talk. Given the seemingly timeless popularity and ubiquity of pious music I felt the need to come up with a list of my favorite pro-atheist songs, many of which are delightfully sacrilegious.

As a toddler, he was put on a throne and worshipped by monks who treated him like a god. But the boy chosen by the Dalai Lama as a reincarnation of a spiritual leader has caused consternation - and some embarrassment - for Tibetan Buddhists by turning his back on the order that had such high hopes for him.

Instead of leading a monastic life, Osel Hita Torres now sports baggy trousers and long hair, and is more likely to quote Jimi Hendrix than Buddha.

According to The Register, Wikipedia has banned multiple IP addresses related to the Church of Scientology for extreme, one-sided editing in an attempt to remove Scientology criticism from the Web. The decision wasn't an easy one though: Wikipedia's Arbitration Committee took nearly half a year to resolve the matter.

The decision, made after users submitted statements, responses, and considerations in what is equivalent to a virtual courtroom, involved votes on 19 principles stating essentially that the Scientology-related accounts violated the core principles of Wikipedia on multiple occasions - even likely coordinating their efforts to erase any critical mentions of Scientology.

Fewer than three-quarters of Canadians believe in a god, suggests a new Canadian Press Harris-Decima survey.

"Religion in Canada today is not a particularly divisive subject and tolerance levels for different beliefs are high," said Harris-Decima president Bruce Anderson. "This is evident in the fact that one in four people feel comfortable saying they do not believe in a god."

The poll found 72 per cent of respondents said they believed in a god, while 23 per cent said they did not believe in any god. Six per cent did not offer an opinion.

Polls have told a different story in the United States.

"Canada's secularism stands in clearer distinction, when compared to the cultural and political influences of religion in the United States," said Anderson. "In one Harris Interactive study in the United States, conducted in 2007, the number who said they were non-believers was only eight per cent."

So it's sort of a mixed bag. The good news is that Roger Ebert was making a joke when he answered questions about Creationism. Granted his answers were so close to Creationist doctrine that no one was certain whether-or-not he was serious about the answers:

Q. When was the earth created?

A. Archbishop James Usher, working out a chronology from the Bible, calculated in 1654 that the earth was created on the night of October 23, 4004 B.C. Other timetables reach back as far as 10,000 years.

Q. What about oil and coal, which seem to have been generated from ancient forests millions of years ago?

A. They are evidence of a Great Flood about 4,400 years ago, which laid down all the layers of sediment at once. They are nowhere near as old as evolutionists and archeologists say. A fossil claimed to be 200 million years old, found in Nevada in 1917, shows a shoe print.

The bad news is that Victoria Jackson, formerly hot comedian from SNL, is not joking when she spouts this insanity from her website:

Thank you President George W. Bush (along with God above) for keeping us safe these last 7 years, from terrorist attacks on our homeland. I really appreciate it very much. xxoo You did a Great job!

And, Thank you God above for giving us George W. Bush, and for giving us John McCain and Sarah Palin.

I was pretty sure she was joking, especially when she said:

I don't want a political label, but Obama bears traits that resemble the anti- Christ and I'm scared to death that un- educated people will ignorantly vote him into office.

But then she's made regular appearances on the 700 Club and considers herself a devout Christian.

About Me

I suppose if you've been reading my site for any length of time, you're probably curious to know who the blogger is, and why he hasn't posted in such a long time. Is he dead? Busy? Lazy? What's his...
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